1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates, in general, to educational tools and display apparatus and in particular to a musical educational apparatus for displaying musical notation for musical instruction and/or use of musical instrumentation, specifically fingering and location of notes on a musical scale.
While the playing of musical instruments and instruction therein have most assuredly progressed over the last several decades, the means for working with notes and understanding the location of notes on the scale and the relationship of the location of notes on an instrument to enable a student to read music and play the comparable note on an instrument has not changed to a significant degree.
Among the conventional means for displaying and learning musical notation are many complex and complicated system not geared to the learning of music or the playing of an instrument by a beginning student who has little or no knowledge of music. Devices which cause a student to make adjustments of physical elements corresponding to the actual adjustments inherent in music have been previously invented and patented. Some of these earlier methods are geared to teaching young students using colors and colored objects. Many others utilize card games.
2. Description of the Prior Art
One of the earliest patents using cards to teach music is the U.S. Patent of Frederickson issued under U.S. Pat. No. 702,298 in 1902. There, Frederickson describes a set of playing cards designed to combine amusement with instruction in the written or printed music staff and notes and in the principles of harmony. Frederickson's system of using playing cards is rather complex and not amenable to the teaching of beginners. The playing cards involve the printing or placing of a portion of the music staff, with the clef mark and different notes thereon, on the faces of the cards, the large note or notes on each card from which that card takes its name representing one value and one tone and the notes on each card differing in value or in tone from those on all of the rest of the cards in the same deck, pack or set. In essence, Frederickson re-adapted the 52 standard playing card deck with musical symbols and notations and devised a novel game using these notations.
Earlier, in 1899, Chamberlin developed another card game for teaching music, U.S. Pat. No. 621,323. Chamberlin noted that previously cards had been adapted to familiarize players with the names and faces of noted authors or to teach natural history or other disciplines. In particular, Chamberlin developed a pack of cards divided into series, suits or books. Each such subdivision illustrating lines, symbols and characters that constitute the rudiments of the science of music.
In 1910, Church in U.S. Pat. No. 972,335 developed and disclosed an educational game device to teach rhythm. Church's game was directed to providing a pupil a strong clear sense of rhythmic pulsation giving particular focus to each note being given a time value or a fraction of one or more counts. Church necessarily involved the application of fractions to an understanding and play of the game. Again, the game was complex, having a complex set of rules and could not be easily understood by a beginner.
In 1917, Noel developed another card game for teaching music, U.S. Pat. No. 1,217,810. His invention was an interesting and positive method by which children, as well as adults, were to learn the rudiments of music without any apparent mental effort and thus eliminate the tedious and tiresome task of memorizing the musical terms and phrases. Unfortunately, Noel's cards were rather complex and were not easily understood by children in the five to ten year age group. The game provided fifty-five playing cards with complex musical notations thereon. A year later, Winnie Deal patented another musical card playing game, U.S. Pat. No. 1,275,869. Her invention provided a deck of playing cards suitable for use at musical gatherings, club meetings and other social occasions in order that the players could play the cards and become familiar with musical scale signatures, key notes and formulas. Again, the notations on the cards were quite complex in comparison to the novel invention and were directed to musical scale signatures for the teaching of sharps and flats in an effort to impart knowledge of musical theory.
Fifty years later in 1968, Aaron in U.S. Pat. No. 3,375,748 patented a new teaching device for musical notation. This invention also involved a musical game. It was directed to permitting the teaching of musical notation to children of the lower age group, such as pre-school age students four or five years of age. Aaron's device required a grid having equally spaced vertical lines and equally spaced horizontal lines, a representation of at least a part of a piano keyboard on one side of the grid and a means for indicating by vertical position on the grid the pitch of a selected note and by horizontal extent on the grid the duration of the selected note. Again, this method also went well beyond teaching the basic scale and by the complexity of its grid required detailed explanation for effective use by beginners.
In 1928, prior to Aaron's invention, Bishop in U.S. Pat. No. 1,675,528 entitled "Instructional Music--Harmony Card Game" attempted improvements in the prior musical card harmony games. Again, the cards for this particular game involved complex notations on cards not easily discernable or learnable by young school children. The Bishop patent, although markedly different, was not a substantial improvement over the musical educational card game of Bostwic patented on May 11, 1915. Also, prior to Aaron, another card game using complex notations on individual cards was developed and patented by Hannah Johnson as U.S. Pat. No. 2,582,544. Its major objective was to provide players with the facilities and cards necessary to learn or recognize octaves at a glance. Her card game required a number of cards with a staff printed thereon, the cards were made up of books of three cards each, of the cards of each book having three pitch notes thereon positioned on its staff and different from the pitch notes of the other books, adjacent notes of each card being an octave apart, one of the three pitch notes being on a different time value than the other two notes and the different time value note on any one card of a book being of a different octave note than the corresponding note of each of the other two cards of the book. This was a delightfully complex game to play in spite of its novel objective to provide learning at a glance.
It is noteworthy to also mention that Fanny Hughey, in 1921, was awarded U.S. Pat. No. 1,526,547 for an instructional set. Her invention was an apparatus for teaching music to young children by the aid of colors and colored objects. Specifically, she provided a means for teaching music using distinctive colors to represent the different tones in a musical scale with the intent that a child would associate a color with a particular note that it represents. She used colored markers in combination with the keyboard of a piano or a chart representing such a keyboard and colored pictures, preferably of birds of the same colors as markers. The pictures were used for the purpose of teaching a child a musical tone which the color of each picture signified. The markers were used for the purpose of identifying keys of the piano corresponding to the colors and tones. In the midst of all of this, approximately twenty years later, McCaulley developed another card game musical instruction device, U.S. Pat. No. 2,231,020. This invention was designed to cause the student to select units from different series of physical elements in a symbol then to make up sequences corresponding to note combinations inherent in music, such as scales and chords. Its major undertaking involved the teaching of major scales, sharp notes or flat notes. Again, its cards were complex and not easily comprehended or understood by children.